About DuPage. Government.

Airport Panel In Turbulence On Privatizing

June 16, 1994|By William Grady, Tribune Staff Writer.

DuPage Airport Authority board members took another step down the road toward privatization last week when they listened to a sales pitch from a joint venture that includes a major-league accounting firm and a former Chicago aviation chief.

But a disagreement between two airport board members near the end of a three-hour meeting suggests that the path ahead is still very much uncertain.

The presentation by representatives from the DuPage Airport Operations and Management Group gave board members their first opportunity to directly question people who are offering to take over day-to-day management of the airfield in West Chicago.

"We're not going to sell you a bill of goods, and we do not propose a `field of dreams' approach," said Howard Stanback, executive vice president of ARP Inc., a Chicago-based consulting firm with expertise in aviation matters and one of the firms in the joint venture. Stanback was Chicago commissioner of aviation under former Mayor Eugene Sawyer.

The airport authority also is looking to the private sector to develop about 800 acres of vacant property it owns and to operate Planemaster Services Inc., the controversial air charter, refueling and flight school business the authority purchased in 1988-though whether Planemaster is privatized or sold is to be discussed at a special meeting tentatively scheduled for later this month.

In addition to ARP, the joint venture includes the accounting firm of Deloitte & Touche; Signature Flight Support Corp., which operates fueling and other aviation-related support businesses at more than 40 locations across the U.S.; and MManTec, a Georgia-based facilities management firm.

The proposal from the DuPage Airport Operations and Management Group was one of 11 received by the airport after the announcement last November that it was considering privatization.

Which of the firms or joint ventures will be invited to make a similar pitch to the airport board was a matter of polite but pointed debate last Thursday between airport authority Chairman George Varney and Commissioner Edwin Burtis.

Varney is convinced that the airport has to offer a complete package if it wants to go the privatization route, which means including in the deal Planemaster, the real estate development and airfield operations. Only two of the proposals seem to approach what Varney sees as a successful privatization plan.

Burtis, though, indicated he wanted to at least listen to other proposals and strongly objected to a quick narrowing of the field.

Meanwhile, the presentation from Stanback and other representatives of the DuPage Airport Operations and Management Group was filled with promises-to increase revenue from airport operations by 6 percent a year, for example, and reduce operating costs by 15 percent-but was a bit vague on specifics.

And board members were quick to put some distance between themselves and a comment made by one of the members of the joint venture team, who observed that "over the long run, I think this is a place that is going to want a commuter (airline)."

Representatives from DuPage Partners group, another joint venture, are scheduled to make their pitch to board members Thursday evening. That group includes Johnson Controls Worldwide, the airport management arm of a $6.2 billion corporation; Hamilton Partners, Itasca-based real estate developers; First Chicago Corp.; and Robert L. Donahue, a Springfield-based airport consultant with ties to Illinois Senate President James "Pate" Philip (R-Wood Dale).